


How Soon Is Now?

by nerdrumple



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Enemies to Lovers, F/M, Modern witches au, Rumbelle Secret Santa 2018, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-23
Updated: 2018-12-23
Packaged: 2019-09-25 17:31:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17125691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerdrumple/pseuds/nerdrumple
Summary: When Belle discovers Mr. Gold's dark secret, she has a choice: shun him, love him, or beat him at his own game.





	How Soon Is Now?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Little_Inkstone](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Little_Inkstone/gifts).



> Apologies for any issues in formatting, this was posted while on a road trip!

**Prologue**

“We’re almost there. We’re close.”

“All right, Papa.”

Bae’s hand was gripped tight in his father’s, getting colder and colder the longer they were out here. But in just a few more moments, _just a few!_ Papa had said, they would find what he was looking for and they could go back home to their warm beds and booming fire, laughing all the way about their rush of an evening to the woods and back.

Papa could have left Bae at home, could have left him snuggled in his bed. But the work Papa was doing, the spell he was casting - until it was finished, it was likely to attract visitors. The kind that Papa didn’t want to leave Bae alone with, he had said. And the visitors had already been scratching at the windows, leaving rocks and bones at the front door. So it was best for Bae to stay with Papa, best to keep safe in Papa’s grip, near Papa’s side, maybe even tucked under Papa’s wool coat. Bae was just about to ask if he could huddle inside when Papa gasped.

Up ahead, a black willow among the pines. Moonlight crested its leaves, and a wide berth surrounded it, a big empty space separating it from its peers.

The tree was huge and terrifying and even Bae could appreciate why Papa wanted to find it so badly.

“Where ya going?” asked a small creature beside Bae.

Bae looked around, though he saw nothing but his Papa.

“Up to the tree?” said the creature.

Bae looked around again and there it was, a small, twisted shadow by Bae’s foot.

“I think we’re going there,” Bae said to the creature.

“Yes, Bae, just up ahead. Then we’ll go home, I promise,” Papa said.

“Up to the tree,” the creature said.

Bae didn’t say anything, as the creature was now leaping forward with its funny shadow legs, up and on ahead of them. Papa almost stepped on the creature, it seemed he didn’t notice the shadow at all.

“This tree is special,” the creature said. “Can’t let ya near it.”

“But why?” Bae asked.

“It has great power, Bae. You’ll see,” Papa said.

Papa mustn’t have heard the creature. Bae tugged on Papa’s hand, but Papa only tugged back.

“The tree requires payment. All trees do,” the creature said.

“Like what?” Bae said.

“You’ll see,” said Papa.

“Probably you,” the creature said. “I’ll go ask.”

Bae frowned as the shadow slunk off across the ground. The tree was bigger now, more terrifying, and he didn’t want to go to it anymore.

“Papa,” Bae said.

“It’s supposed to open,” Papa said, placing a hand upon the tree’s trunk. It was black and knotty, and the creature was returning, larger this time, nearly as large as the tree.

“The tree will accept the boy,” the creature said, its voice so much bigger now, but Papa still didn’t hear it.

“But I don’t want to,” said Bae, as the creature reached down and began to tug on Bae’s other hand.

“There!” Papa said, “It’s opening!”

But then Bae was pulling Papa’s hand, pulling hard, pulling frantic. When Papa looked down, Bae was being pulled, pulled and pulled, and Papa grew very cold and yelling and frantic too.

“No!” Papa yelled. “Give him back! Give him back! Bae!”

“The tree accepts,” the creature said again, and Bae was tugged back and forth, back and forth between Papa and creature and eventually into the tree, for trees are always stronger.

“No!” Papa yelled. “No!”

The tree had opened, just as Papa had said, but now it was closing. Bae was curling up inside, and Papa said not to let go of his hand, so he didn’t. Papa was doing his very best not to let go, tugging and tugging, and when the tree closed around his hand, it took it right along with his boy.

Papa fell backwards, screaming and crying and yelling. When he looked down at his wrist, smooth and pale where his hand had once been, and where his beautiful boy had once been, he screamed and cried and yelled some more.

Bae curled up small, cried and yelled too. He was warm, though, it was much warmer in here, though it was dark and a little cramped. Papa’s hand squeezed his, and he squeezed back. 

Bae held Papa’s hand, and wouldn’t let go. Papa had told him not to, so he wouldn’t.

 

 

_Years Later_

 

**One**

Belle’s flowers were wilting.

African violets, slumped over and lifeless in a matter of moments. And in a few more moments, Mr. Gold walking through her library doors, arriving to return last week’s reads.

Other patrons walked through her doors, of course, but it was Mr. Gold who approached her circulation desk, Mr. Gold she sought to stash her flowers away from and out of his view. She did so haphazardly, a few clumps of dirt left behind in her haste. But he said nothing of the mess, none the wiser to the alerts she’d placed about the library to warn her when nefarious creatures were lurking about.

“Morning, Miss French.”

“M-morning, Mr. Gold.”

She held out her hands for his books, flicking casually at the dirt like it was any common library occurrence, and nodded at his small greeting. She didn’t allow herself to look down at her poor bygone flowers; this was the longest she’d gotten the poor things to live, damn it all. Now they were shriveled-up nothings she’d have to toss.

After a spell or two, of course, to determine just how dangerous Mr. Gold was.

Belle was already familiar with the rumors about town that he was a grump, a heartless man, an asshole. He was her landlord, after all; she’d seen just how cool his temperature could drop. But he was pleasant enough when frequenting the library, pleasant enough when making his rounds for rent. This was a new development entirely! She should have enchanted her library earlier!

“I appreciate your recommendations, Miss French. These did not disappoint.”

She nodded at his books as she scanned them back into her system. A Virginia Woolf novel, a non-fiction on pines, a collection of short essays on famous disappearances. She nodded, and nodded again.

“Your eyes are furrowed.”

“They are not,” she said.

“You’re bothered this morning. Another elementary field trip arriving this afternoon?” he asked, and her eyes furrowed some more.

“You know I like those,” she scolded.

“If that’s what you want them to believe, you’d better school your eyebrows, then.”

Their banter, usually so welcome, had her heart overbeating. Her face was probably pale, her eyes probably just as narrowed as he said. She looked up at the man she knew beyond an acquaintance, but wasn’t quite ready to call friend, and tried to blink away the expression he had accused her of.

“Sorry,” she said, licking her lips, “you said you liked these?”

“I did,” he said flatly as she finished scanning, a frown beginning to form on his mouth. She liked his mouth, had managed a laugh out of it once or twice before, but was having a hard time looking at it just now. His brogue, too; she often engaged him in conversation just because she liked hearing it. Was that part of whatever he was, then? Soothing sound to lure victims to whatever he was, the man who had wilted her flowers.

“I’m an incubus and I’m going to eat you,” Mr. Gold said.

“Sorry?” Belle said, dropping the pines book.

“Is that the local author shelf behind you?”

Belle turned, ah yes, the cart she’d just assembled this morning. The local author display she was going to arrange at the front entrance, all about beloved but deceased Constance Merriweather, Storybrooke’s flora and fauna expert from a decade prior.

“I,” she said, which seemed answer enough, as a giant banner declaring _Local Author!_ written in vines and leaves adorned the shelf.

“Yes,” she said anyway.

“You’re quite the conversationalist today. Do you mind if I have a look?” Mr. Gold asked.

She must have nodded again, for he was behind the desk and eyeing titles along spines before any answer could pop into her head.

She placed herself in front of her wilted violets, hiding them from his view. She bent down and retrieved the book she’d dropped, keeping focus on Mr. Gold’s back, arched and busy with Merriweather’s expansive catalogue.

It was a good back. Sharp shoulder blades and a pretty spine, muscles making pleasant movements underneath his suit with the pass of his arm as he searched her cart. Long arms, good arms, one with a hand and one without, the arm with the hand leaning on a cane that was gold-tipped and looked good for swinging, though Belle tried not to think about that.

The cane was ornate and fancy, like the rest of him. He wore fine suits everyday, tailored to fit him just so. He was slim and slight, jagged at the elbows and chin and nose, and when he smiled he _did_ tilt his head like he was an incubus who very much wanted to eat her. His hair was long and soft and would accompany the smile well.

“You’re missing _The Faraway Nearby_ ,” he said.

“You wilted my flowers,” she wanted to say, but instead stared at his shoes, high shining and black and she could see herself reflected in them.

“ _The Faraway Nearby_ ,” he repeated when she said nothing. “Her journals on our local forests.”

“Right,” Belle said, moving her eyes up to his cane. “We have it, it’s just checked out right now.”

“Mmm,” he nodded, rising, tucking his cane into his elbow, grabbing a book from the cart. “I’ll take this one. You look tired.”

Belle said nothing, as she was sure _tired_ was just his euphemism for jumpy and unsure.

“And your blouse is open.”

She startled, reaching up to grab at the, _oh, damn it all_ , yes, open patch of her shirt. She did up the buttons with shaking hands, Mr. Gold’s mouth staying as thin as ever.

Her heel tapped the back of her flower pot and he hadn’t so much as looked down to see the strange mess stashed under her desk, so perhaps the little flash of cleavage had saved her.

“Get some rest,” he said, handing her his selection. “And check a mirror before stepping out of your apartment for the day, yeah?”

She rest the book he’d chosen on the counter, _Familiar Slither: Amphibians & Reptiles of Northern Maine_, and watched as he walked away, out into the shelves for whatever else he was going to pick that day. She pretended to click on her computer, shuffle cards about, pick up a pencil and put it down again, all the while waiting for Mr. Gold to return.

Two novels and another non-fiction later, she was checking out his books and running an errant hand over the seam of her buttons to make sure they still held. He offered a smile at the motion, that tilted one, and it _did_ go well with his soft hair. It blended with Merriweather’s cover as she looked down, its illustration of a snake entangled in _Slither_ ’s font.

It was all she could see for the rest of the day. That smile, that snake.

The end of the day and closing of the library had her rushing upstairs with her violets. The poor things were nearly wisped into ash by the time she was able to reach her apartment, and once safely secured and locked behind her door, she set the pot on her windowsill. The one facing the moon, the one facing away from Gold’s shop where it rest across the street from the library.

She pulled out a jar of rainwater she’d charged during last month’s lunar cycle, and a small white candle, fresh and never before lit. She bathed it in the rainwater, once, twice, three times for good measure. With a needle, she carved Mr. Gold’s name into its side, rubbing her thumb over the completed carving, and tried not to think of his cane, his own thumb rubbing.

Flame lit, she watched it flicker a moment, her eagerness to ask her question stifled by her sudden inability to take breath. She’d been moving too fast, rushing too fast. She closed her eyes, calmed herself. Counting her heartbeats usually did the trick, but the blood through her ears kept her from hearing anything.

When the wax had melted down to the period in _Mr._ , she finally asked her question.

“What are you?”

She lifted the candle and brought its flame to what remained of her ashy flowers. A bud ignited, returning life to its purple petals, though the purple lasted only a moment before shading into black. Soft and velvet again, lush again, but black.

“A witch,” Belle muttered. “Dark magic.”

It felt silly uttering the words. Belle was a witch herself, after all. She’d tested the color of her magic before, once. A pretty pale blue, nothing like the black violet in her pot.

She plucked the flower from its ashy stem, studied it in the moonlight. Down near the center, the black lightened to another color, a simple gray.

This would require further study, it would. Further investigation into his head tilts, his brogue, his hand rubbing the gold tip of his cane and his hand that was missing. A long time ago, when she’d first come to town, he suggested she visit his shop should she ever need anything.

Well. A visit to his shop she would make.

Belle rolled the flower bud between her fingertips before stoppering it into a small glass bottle. She watched her candle continue to burn the rest of the way down, the _G_ , the _o_ , the _l_ , the _d_ , until the wax rest sloppy and sedate in the bottom of its holder. She gathered up the mess, wrapped it in a small bit of burlap, drove out to the woods, and buried it in the ground. She cast what small bit of light magic she could over the spot, hands making the sigil for _rest_ , mouth whispering a chant for _none the wiser_ , and drove back home.

 

 

**Two**

He was a dealmaker.

He knew what you needed before you did, and could give you better than whatever it was you were asking for. He knew how to alight excitement, but he also knew how to curl his lip when you weren’t looking.

Belle knew all this, had heard the rumors, but it was different watching it all transpire from her safe spot on the corner, across the street and at an angle just right to see Mr. Gold’s Pawnshop & Antiques customers file in and out of his door.

Little antiquing seemed to be happening, however.

After hanging around his shop for the better part of the day, Belle concluded that Gold’s magic consisted of answers to questions his patrons thought needed answering. They came at steep prices, ones that left customers worse off than before they started. He had a reputation _not be trifled with!_ but was nevertheless trifled with frequently.

People left either vibrating with excitement or their heads in their hands. Belle couldn’t hear what was said, of course, but when Ashley Boyd left Gold’s shop with a small teddy bear in her hands, she decided she was done watching for the day, and followed Ashley all the way to her waitressing job at the diner.

“I’m pregnant,” Ashley said to her coworker once her apron was on, teddy bear resting atop the counter.

Ruby, the girl’s fellow waitress and an ill-prepared receiver of such alarming news just before lunch rush, bugged her eyes out of her head.

“Does … does Sean know?”

“He will,” Ashley said. “It’s all right. We’re going to be OK,” she said, grasping the bear once more, toying with its nose, its eyes. A pat to her still-flat tummy, another pat to the bear.

Belle, having tucked herself into a booth, buried her face in her menu at the announcement. It was a confession between friends and meant for no eavesdropper like herself. But how it made her chew her lip! She couldn’t even read the words on the menu, muttering “Iced tea,” with poor pronunciation when Ashley came to take her order.

“Cute,” Belle said when Ashley returned with her drink, the strange teddy having been tucked into the strings of her apron.

Ashley smiled down at the bear, and nodded at Belle’s acknowledgement as she set her glass in front of her.

“It’s for good luck,” Ashley smiled.

It absolutely wasn’t. Belle could feel it wafting off the bear in waves, little but there, small pulses. Like the heartbeat of a small, pea-sized child growing inside a mother’s womb.

_Doubt, doubt, doubt._

Insecurity, fear, desperation. Oh, there was a layer of excitement covering all that, large enough to get the child to the size of proper cradling and snuggling. But once that layer burst, the doubt would get everywhere. Ashley was a part-time waitress, after all, and Belle couldn’t quite remember which minimum wage job Sean held.

But she did know that Regina Mills had stopped by Mr. Gold’s earlier that day, and she knew that the woman had left with a set of adoption paperwork.

Belle took approximately three sips of her iced tea, ran a finger down the cool of the glass, tipped heavily, and left.

 

**Three**

It was easy to track her progress, if she kept it alongside Ashley’s pregnancy.

In the first month Belle learned that Mr. Gold enchanted his paperwork to alert him when a term was about to be broken. No secret in regard to a deal you’d made with him could be kept if you’d willingly signed your name - that seemed the factor that bound you to him, your name.

And, quite curiously, his own name was contained on no legal document. All patrons were bound to the shop, Mr. Gold’s Pawnshop & Antiques.

In the second month, Belle took notice of the clouds of surveillance that hung over town, twinged in Mr. Gold’s color. Certain homes were shrouded in it; the Mayor’s, in particular, was thick with its cover.

A cloud in the woods, too, perhaps he had a monstrous pet lurking there?

Even people carried the cloud with them. Some were obvious rivals - Mr. Midas, Killian Jones - but when she noticed the cloud around Henry, a young boy in Mary Margaret's elementary class, she began to gnaw her lip in worry.

The third month brought the discovery of a hex on the fountain in town square. When passersby tossed in a coin, some token of bad luck happened upon them immediately, if not within a half hour. Tripping and landing on their face, dropping whatever they were carrying and watching it scatter, a bird shitting on their head. Belle tested the fountain herself by tossing in a coin, and sure enough the heel of her shoe broke the moment she turned to walk away.

With an entire trimester out of the way, Belle had learned that Mr. Gold wasn’t merely a grump, a heartless man, an asshole - he was a dick as well.

Reversing the hex was simple. A little lavender and mugwort charm later, and the fountain was soon delivering pleasant daydreams, lost dollar bills rediscovered in pockets, and shy eye contact between crushes across streets.

The clouds of surveillance were more picky to penetrate, and Belle worried they’d simply alert her activity to him if she tried. She could, however, create a cloud of her own around the homes and people. If he was going to watch the town, so be it, but his view would now be foggy.

There were games he played, people he taunted. Some she understood, some she didn’t. He was keen on closing down businesses similar to his own, keen on pushing out other landlords in town. The nuns, however, were desperately trying to raise money to keep up with Gold’s monthly rent in the building they were housed. Gold seemed to take great delight in foiling their plans for no other reason than it brought him amusement.  

The signed away names were impossible to return. Even Belle couldn’t reverse what’d been given in free will. But not every contract was legally binding, he’d made plenty of verbal deals, and Belle could only hope Ashley’s teddy bear had been one.

As Ashley’s second trimester unfolded, Belle became a regular at the diner, watching the pregnant waitress from her booth while she sipped slowly on her iced tea, indulged in a burger or late night pancakes every now and then. Ashley’s excitement over her pregnancy had taken a focus on health - daily vitamins, no caffeine, no heavy lifting - she made Ruby carry all her heavy trays, though the girl was only just starting to show. The excitement that radiated from the teddy bear was infectious - Granny and Ruby doted on Ashley, though perhaps they would have done so regardless of an enchantment.

Ashley kept that bear on her always, always, always. In the pocket of her apron, in the bag she carried when she checked in and out of shifts - and, Belle didn’t doubt, in her bed with her when she slept at night. It made it exceedingly difficult to get a hold of the bear so she could remove the enchantment. Belle still wasn’t quite sure what kind of game Mr. Gold was playing at in wanting Ashley’s baby, but certainly no good could come of it. The sooner she got to the bear, the sooner she could remove the _doubt_ before it ever came into being.

Belle rose from her booth, passing Ashley with a nod and a thank you on her way out into the night. Summer had come and gone, crisp scents were starting to fill the air, the promise of Mabon on the way. For now, a waning gibbous was in the sky, a new moon approaching, and Belle closed her eyes to the still streetlights around her. They polluted her view of the stars up above, but they were their own form of lovely, and that was enough.

She couldn’t get a bear, she couldn’t blow clouds away. She needed help.

“Mama,” Belle whispered to the night. “His influence is everywhere. What do I do?”

Her mother had passed several years prior, but Belle still felt her presence in still moments like this. With one last glance towards the diner, Belle sent a sad smile Ashley’s way, and started her walk home.

The library sat across from Mr. Gold’s shop, and perhaps that’s why he’d never bothered to infect it with a cloud. He could just look out the window, or come in and harass her like he usually did. _Harass_ was a strong word - he was polite to the point of charming, it was she who now cut their conversations short and acted like he wasn’t standing in front of her. Their interactions used to be so amicable, so anticipated. She missed them, and that was very silly of her.

Belle approached his shop, gone and dark of its owner, but couldn’t get herself beyond halfway across the street before she was frowning at it. She shook her head and turned her back to its door, looking up at the moon again.

“What would you do, Mama?”

The moon didn’t answer, and Belle closed her eyes.

“Beautiful night,” his strong brogue said behind her.

Belle startled, hands leaping out of the pockets of her coat. Apparently the shop’s owner hadn’t gone home after all.

“Yes,” she replied, red faced, stuffing her hands back into her coat. She blinked as her eyes adjusted to the sight of Mr. Gold.

He was handsome, so handsome, the moon silvering his hair and his shape perfect and slim in the dark. It made her blink away again, made her recite all the awful things she’d discovered about him in the past few months so she would stop thinking about how very handsome he looked.

“Am I interrupting something?” he asked, soft this time.

“You mean, was I busy talking to myself?” Belle said, sad smile. “No one’s answering, anyway. How’s, um,” she said, thinking, trying to remember, “how’s the crime novel?” The one he’d borrowed earlier in the week, she couldn’t remember the title.

“Also not answering. My interest, that is. Not one of your better recommendations.”

Had she recommended it? She didn’t read crime, it must have been another of her fumbled attempts to get him out of the library before she revealed herself to him. Or kept liking him.

He stepped closer, and she stepped back. He stiffened. She wasn’t a fool - she knew he noticed the change in her, the stifled interactions in the library, her bare responses to his conversation. His own eyes had narrowed then in understanding, in acceptance. They narrowed now, and he took his step back.

“Well. Good night, Miss French. Have a lovely evening.”

She didn’t say anything, watching as he started a slow lurch to his shop.

She released her hands from her pockets this time, normal pace this time, and against her better judgment, allowed herself to find him handsome.

“How’s the Shirley Jackson?” she called out.

His lurch came to a halt, and he turned around.

“Better. Better than the crime novel. Better at answering my interests.”

“That one’s a crime novel, too. Sort of.”

“A mystery,” he replied. “No one’s dodging bullets or chasing cars.”

“So you prefer a more . . . subtle form of attack.”

He smiled, and she could feel the vein of their old library interactions slowly pulsing again.

“I like to be quiet in my _attack_ , as you put it.”

“Like . . . poison?”

He chuckled. “You better not be spoiling Shirley Jackson for me.”

“Only a little,” she smiled. “Keep reading. You’ll see.”

She looked down at a puddle in the street, one that stood between them and kept either one from moving closer. The moon was inside, and their faces, reflected back at her. If she looked unblinking, she could see his face move closer to hers, his nose bury in her hair, breathe deep.

“Ashley’s pregnant,” Belle blurted. “Did-did you hear?”

Gold’s smile drew thin. “I’d heard.”

“Good news, don’t you think?”

He took a moment before answering. “I think she’s a waitress, and her boyfriend just lost his job down at the docks.”

“Did he?” she asked, eyes furrowing, wondering if Mr. Gold had anything to do with it. Maybe he wasn’t so handsome after all, really, if he could scowl and smile at the same time like that.

“She’s very happy,” Belle said.

The scowl softened. “That she is, that she is.”

He knew very well why Ashley was happy, Belle knew. She watched him briefly get lost in his own thoughts, his own schemes, and when she looked down at the puddle, his face was no longer near her own. Had his sway been in that puddle, earlier?

He created clouds, he hexed fountains. If there was a way for her to hold his magic, was there a way for her to affect that teddy bear without actually having to touch it, get hold of it?

“Do you,” she started, fumbling for a beginning, “do you, em, have any books, in your shop?”

“Yes,” he said.

“In your shop,” she continued, “do you have first editions, or the like?”

He stared at her, taking a while to answer. “Not many people actually come to my shop for its wares.”

“Well,” she said, “would it be so terrible if I did?”

“You’ve never come into my shop,” he said, eyeing her.

“Do . . . you not want me to?”

“I didn’t say that,” he said, relaxing his stance. She hadn’t noticed the way he’d been leaning forward, and found herself leaning back as well. He was quiet a long time again, staring at her, and she was too nervous to look down at the puddle again. He rubbed his cane, tilted his head.

“I’m here, now,” he eventually said, a sigh accompanying him. “You can make your request. We don’t have to wait until we’re back at the shop.”

He could see intention, probably, she realized. What else did witches deal in if not intention?

“But we do,” Belle said. “That’s where the books are.”

“The books,” he said.

“If you have them.”

“I do.”

“Well. I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

“For books.”

“Yes,” she said, trying to turn away, trying to close the conversation as naturally as possible. “I’m a librarian, I love books.”

It was sloppy, but it was stated, so with a swish of her skirt she headed to her library, her apartment, and tried to swallow the heart that had leapt into her throat.

 

**Four**

“You’ll come, yes?”

Sister Astrid was handing Belle a flyer, the one to the Harvest Concert Fundraiser, and it made her chew her lip. The local convent did this every year, tried to raise money to keep their congregation afloat, but it was rumored that if they didn’t meet their goal this year, the convent would be closed for good.

Of course, it was Mr. Gold they owed their money to, Mr. Gold who sat in their aisles and watched the concert with amusement, never donating more than a penny to their cause. Astrid had told Belle many times that Mr. Gold would love nothing more than to see the nuns evicted from the building, and Belle now knew Astrid wasn’t far off the mark.

Belle nodded eagerly at Sister Astrid though her eyes were sad. Of course she’d donate to the fundraiser, of course she’d go to the concert.

When Sister Astrid turned to enter Gold’s shop, Belle grabbed her arm.

“You’re going in there?”

“Yes?” Sister Astrid said.

“To distribute more flyers? He won’t let you hang one, you know that.”

“Oh, I know. But Mr. Gold has to approve our cast list. It’s. Um. In our contract with him.”

Belle said nothing, gaping at the strange stipulation Gold had put upon the nuns. It wasn’t the strangest she’d heard of him doing, however. Signed names were hidden away in this place, Mr. Gold’s true precious commodity, she knew, and she wondered what requests were attached to each signature.

Or if he’d try to get her own.

She had told Mr. Gold she’d be in tomorrow, and tomorrow was today.

“Well,” Belle said before she and the nun went inside. “Before you go in, give me some of that tape.”

Sister Astrid handed her tape over, and much to the nun’s surprise, Belle taped a Harvest Fundraiser flyer to Gold’s shop window.

“There,” Belle said, smiling at her work. “If he can approve the cast list, he can very well hang your damn flyer.”

Sister Astrid smiled, reddening a little.

“Oh,” Belle said. “Sorry. Um. Your _darn_ flyer.”

The nun smiled again, waving off Belle’s apology. “Just not used to hearing it in that context, is all.”

The bell to Gold’s shop rang with their entrance, and he looked up, standing dutifully at the counter as though waiting for their very arrival. His brow went up, probably the only acknowledgement Belle would get for her small act of plastering the sign in his shop window. He’d surely seen the whole thing, and would reward her by tearing the flyer down the moment she left.

“Mr. Gold!” Sister Astrid started, much too bright, and Belle peeled away from her side to wander the shop. The nun approached him with a list in hand, and they started whatever discussion was needed for satisfying her contract with him.

Belle had never been in Gold’s shop. It was dark and warm and she frowned for how much she loved it. Strange trinkets were everywhere, magical objects that none other than a witch could appreciate. She felt silly for never having come in before, her flowers needn’t have alerted her to anything if she’d just stepped inside here but once.

She could sense and smell enchantments everywhere, some sour and creeping, others sweet and cooing. Some contained sensuality, some contained trust, but most contained some form of luck, varying degrees of good and bad among them. Jewelry, statues, paintings, watches, mirrors, trinkets.

No stuffed animals.

Some objects glimmered in a way that suggested their appearance had been altered. Just as Belle reached forward to touch a grouping of wooden boxes, some with clear sigils upon them, a shadow approached her.

“Here for books?” he asked.

Belle turned, just in time to see Sister Astrid leaving the shop with the small clang of the shop bells. She couldn’t see anything beyond the swish of Sister Astrid’s cloak, but if Gold had upset the poor girl, she wasn’t above stepping on his foot.

“Was she crying?” Belle asked.

Gold scoffed. “Is that what you think I do in here? Make people cry all day?”

“Part of the day, at least.”

He huffed another breath, small laugh this time. “Would you like to cry?”

She rose her chin. “I’d like to see your books.”

“Hmm,” he said, turning away. “This way, then.”

She followed him to a tall wooden cabinet in the back of the shop. A luscious dark wood with dusty glass doors. He tucked his cane into his elbow and extracted a key from his pocket to unlock it. It was dark inside, too dark, she could make out spines inside but not a single title, not even when he opened the glass doors.

He backed away and held out his arm, inviting her to step up to the cabinet and have a look. She hesitated a moment, it was so dark, but she couldn’t feel any danger beyond the feeling of anticipation in her gut, and stepped forward.

She held a hand up but did not touch. The books seemed to breath against her, and Mr. Gold had stepped closer, right behind her.

“Do you know what you're looking for?” he asked.

“. . . no.”

“I can tell.”

“Are you so against browsing?”

The space around them was small, and he reached around her into the dark of the cabinet, brushing her hair, her neck, and pulled out a book.

It was old, dusty, perfect. Its cover was weathered and its pages yellowed. Deep green cover, dark script adorning its spine.

Belle gasped. “Ellis Bell?”

“You’re a fan of the Brontë sisters, I take it?”

“This is, before they all came out as women, and she had to publish under a man’s name, how did you?”

He rest the book in her waiting palms, and she smiled, and forgot for a moment what she was there for. A first edition of _Wuthering Heights_ , she could hardly contain herself! But then wait, no, he had placed it in her bare hands, with its oils that could damage such a fine thing, from a case where it had been sandwiched so close and tight between other books. She turned its cover this way and that, and yes, magic was seething all across it.

Would it be enough?

She could feel the pulse around it, how very amazing it was that he’d pulled her favorite book before she’d even said anything. Is this how it went with other patrons? And had she said a title, any title, would he have reached in and grabbed it?

She turned around, forgetting to be coy, to be colored _highly impressed!_ and full of want. Instead, real impression adorned her face, and she searched his eyes as he looked down on her.

“How did you know?”

The shop bell rang.

He blinked down at her a moment longer, but the invasion had already broken their moment. Dr. Whale was entering, from the sound of it, grumbling Gold’s name followed by a complaint. Gold gave her a soft smile before leaving her side to deal with the man.

“Pardon me, Miss French. I’ll be just a moment.”

Belle took a deep breath as he left, a pressure upon her chest lifting, and she looked down at the book once more.

It wasn’t a first edition, it wasn’t a Brontë, she knew that. She tried to school her face, as he’d once suggested she do, and look around the shop again. The book had magic, but she worried it wasn’t enough.

She needed something pungent, simply swarming with his magic. One of the objects covered in luck would probably do it, and she walked about his shop, trying to feel what was around her rather than trust her eyes.

An obvious thrum sounded from behind his counter.

Belle looked towards the front of the shop. Gold had his back to her, his muscles bunching in agitation as he spoke with Whale. She took the distraction that was offered to her, and headed behind his counter.

A curtain led to the back room, and she lifted it carefully. There were more trinkets here, more paintings, books, objects scattered about with less organization than she could decipher from his display area. The thrum that had caught her wasn’t coming from any of these objects, however, but from a set of cards resting on a small round table just beyond the curtain.

Her eyebrows lifted as she recognized the type of cards they were right away, the same cards she used in her own rituals and spells.

A seven-card spread she didn’t immediately recognize was placed across the table. She scanned the cards for their meaning, a few jumping out at her: the king of pentacles, the queen of swords. All the cards of the spread were flipped upright but one, the one that was thrumming at her, the one that had called.

Curious, and with a hand that knew better, she reached forward and flipped the card.

The moment she touched it, her vision and skin were overtaken. She was above him, straddling his waist while his arms wrapped around her, his hand making its way up her back, bare, warm, hot, then tangling in her hair, pulling her mouth down to his. Their breath was heavy together, and she tasted the sweat along his forehead before answering his lips with her own, and the vision disappeared just as quickly as it started.

Belle nearly tripped, reaching out and grabbing the shop curtain before she fell. She looked down at the card in her hand, blinking as its identity came into focus.

The Lovers.

She put the card back down on the table, and turned to leave.

Sailing through the back curtain, she bumped right into a waiting Mr. Gold, hands fumbling at his chest while her face grew red. Dr. Whale had gone, her distraction having left all too quickly. Gold steadied her with a hand, and she spoke before he could say anything.

“How much?” she blurted, the book between them in her trembling grip.

He didn’t even look at it. “More than you can afford. What are you doing back here?”

She ignored him. “How much?”

He placed a hand on the book’s cover, all the while looking at her. “You’re sure this is the one you want?”

She nodded.

“You’re sure this is _what_ you want?” he asked again.

“Yes,” she said, the word too loud.

He sighed, and narrowed his eyes at her.

“What if I told you the cost was a kiss?”

Her tongue went dry. “That’d be highly inappropriate of you.”

“So’s digging through my back room where you’re not allowed. I prefer _knowing_ what it is my patrons are after, Miss French.”

“I just want the book.”

“Is that why you’re back here, then? Rifling through my things?” he pushed past her, throwing back the curtain and looking around, immediately drawn to the table where the card was probably ratting her out. He looked down, down to where she’d been touching his tarot cards, the Lovers face up, and her face reddened further.

He reached down to touch the card. He lifted it up, staring at it, and if he was having the same sudden vision, his face did little to betray it.

Before he could speak, before he could look at her, she kissed him on the cheek.

“There’s your payment. Thank you for the book, Mr. Gold.”

She rushed out of his shop before he could reply.

 

**Five**

The woods were the only place to do this.

She came to the woods for every Sabbat, but this was a special emergency, and she needed her favorite tree. A black willow in the middle of an open patch of land, separated from the dense pines surrounding it. The walk to it was good, long and winding and allowing her time to think properly about the task at hand. The book she’d purchased sat ready in her bag, the kiss she’d bestowed upon his cheek sat burning on her lips.

She had worried the magic contained in the book wouldn’t be enough, but since the kiss she’d given Gold, the magic seemed to increase threefold. The book was positively heavy with it! She decreed herself ready, and planned carefully for her trip to the woods, carrying with her a glass orb, some water, some wormwood, matches, an athame, an apple.

The last two weren’t for her spell.

Belle approached the tree, the one that was her favorite, the one that felt so sad. Darker forces seemed to lurk about it, and she bid them away, bid them leave the tree so it could find some respite. Woods were tricky places; rings of salt didn’t respond here, sigils took on multiple meanings, dark and light tipped in overabundance depending on which glen you entered.

Belle patted the tree’s trunk and greeted it warmly, as she always did, and sat down snug into its side, as she always did. She sat under its largest knot, a wide and gapping thing that was impossibly large. She pulled out her apple, as she always did, took out her athame, as she always did. She said a small chant for friendship and wellbeing, and sliced the apple sideways.

The horizontal cut revealed the apple’s hidden five-pointed star inside. She recited the five points, _air, earth, fire, water, spirit,_ happy for the small comfort the apple brought her, but it wasn’t for her. She reached inside the tree’s largest knot, and placed the two halves of her apple inside. A small pulse of comfort emitted from the tree, and she patted its trunk.

“Five points are everywhere, you know,” she said. “Five fingers, five toes. Flowers with five petals. Starfish,” she giggled, and the tree seemed to like that.

She pocketed her athame, sighed at the evening ahead of her, and pulled out her things.

It was time to start.

The book in her hands, the lovely and amazing and perfect first edition of _Wuthering Heights_ , was not a lovely and amazing and perfect first edition after all. It was a glamour, she knew, but she was still sad to see it go. She lay the book down upon her meager, impromptu altar: a small board, a small cloth, three bowls. She filled one bowl with water and placed it north, in the others she lit her wormwood, placing them east and west, making sure their streams of smoke did not cross. She scooped a handful of dirt from the ground and scattered it south, and then, finally, in the middle of it all, she placed her book.

For this spell the orb would hold her air, and she toyed with it a moment, bringing it to her lips. She pictured Gold, whispered his name, let the orb take her breath, and remembered the kiss she’d placed upon his cheek. His warm skin the moment she’d done it, the rush that had gone through her. Her _payment_ , as he’d requested.

And she remembered the vision the card had brought her. The way her brain and body fell completely to the sensation of skin and heat, sweat and breathing. The way he’d felt between her legs, thick and eager, the way her chest had felt safe upon his. His hand in her hair. She breathed over the orb, her remembrance, her intention, and placed it upon the book.

 _Pull_ , she whispered, and pull it did.

It was simple. No lightning, no thunder, just color filling the orb while it drained the book of its appearance. What was once weathered green was now plain blue, what was once yellowed pages were now white and crisp. A blank-paged, ordinary book, nothing to keep away in a glass case or demand a kiss over.

She expected the orb to be swirling with black now, and it was, but bits of gray were streaked here and there. Like her violet bud from before, black with its gray center. She turned the orb this way and that, watched its swirls as the sun began to set.

She sat peaceful with the orb in her lap, considering her next steps. The wormwood burnt down, and when it was nothing but ash, she let it mix with her dirt and blow to the ground, poured out her water, said her thanks, and packed up her things.

“I’ll be back soon,” she said to the tree, patting its trunk, caressing its knot. It was a quiet goodbye, and she made her way through the woods and back into town as the last bits of sunlight disappeared beyond the horizon.

Coming upon Main street, she heard music coming from the convent, as well as a voice that was doing its very best to join the melody.

Creaking and croaking, whoever it was sounded like they needed a good week of rest in bed, and had no business singing. As Belle got closer to the convent, she saw Sister Astrid sitting on its front steps, staring at the sky, mouth drawn into a frown, fingers fiddling with her black dress.

Belle walked up the steps, offered a small smile and wave before taking a seat beside her friend.

“So … how’s the Harvest Concert rehearsal going?” she asked.

“I’m sure you can hear it,” Sister Astrid said.

“I hear, um, something. What is it, exactly, that I’m hearing?”

The terrible croaking noise escaped the church door again, followed by a tearful wail.

“That’s our lead,” Sister Astrid said, sad crinkles in her worried face. “Her voice … her singing … something happened … she sounds like a -”

“Frog,” Belle finished.

Sister Astrid nodded. “I guess that’s the only way to put it.”

“Can you … um … she sounds like she needs vocal rest.”

“To be ready in time for the fundraiser? I doubt that will help.”

“Does she have an understudy?”

“She should, but Mr. Gold won’t allow it.”

Gold. Of course. Gold. He wanted control of who to cast, and he was going to enforce it, just in time for the big fundraiser to try and save the nuns from his swift kick of eviction.

“You can’t replace her with … anybody?”

Another croak sailed through the door.

Sister Astrid winced. “We can’t. We already asked Mr. Gold.”

Belle looked down at her bag, the orb inside with Gold’s swirling magic. She’d only just extracted it, she still had no idea how she was going to manipulate it.

She needed to work fast.

 

**Six**

“Oh, I knew you’d come!”

“Of course, Astrid. You can always count on me.”

Belle nodded warmly to Sister Astrid while placing her donation into the nun’s waiting basket. It was as large a bill as she could afford, but Belle worried it would make little more than a dent in tonight’s fundraiser. Looking around her, the seats were still fairly empty, and the concert was due to start any moment.

Much to everyone’s surprise, the nuns had decided to push on with their Harvest Concert.

It was rumored their lead singer had a strange bout of creaking, croaking, wailing frog voice. Whatever it was, there was fear it was contagious, and the last thing anyone wanted to do was pick up such a wretched sickness before the rest of the holidays went into full swing.

Belle very well knew Gold was responsible for the poor lead’s predicament. The reek of his magic was all over it, of similar smell and taste to the magic she’d gathered in her orb. Gold’s magic had been a strong and wily thing, lashing out at her attempts to manipulate it, understand it. Only when she presented it with a soft touch did it respond to her will.

Belle hoped very, very much that her spell for the evening would work.

She removed her coat and took a seat towards the middle, wanting a good, clear view of the lead singer when they took the stage. She sat alone, but noted the familiar faces around her. Mary Margaret and David, up towards the front, huddled in conversation. Regina and Emma off to the side, not talking, arms folded, but elbows touching nevertheless. Sitting opposite of them was Sean and Ashley, her belly round and full and ready to birth at any moment. Sean had one arm about her, the other caressing her stomach. Between them, Gold’s teddy bear, which Ashley still clung to at every possible moment.

That spell had been far trickier.

Sister Astrid stayed at the church doors, accepting donations for the fundraiser, a pay-as-you-like entry fee with the hopes patrons would choose an amount in the double digits or more. Worry still crinkled Sister Astrid’s brow, however, her basket about as empty as the seats before her. And it wrinkled further when a familiar, tapping cane made its way up the steps.

“Sister Astrid,” Belle heard him say, turning around to see Mr. Gold arriving in a long woolen trench coat, fine scarf about his neck, leather glove on his hand. He shifted his cane to his elbow, retrieved a coin from his pocket, and held it out to the nun at the door.

“Oh. Um. This is a penny,” Sister Astrid said, helpful smile on her face.

Mr. Gold nodded. “My donation for the evening. Try not to spend it all in one place.”

Sister Astrid’s smile fell, and Belle scrunched up her nose as Gold made his way down the aisle. When he got to her row, he took a long pause before moving in and taking a seat beside her.

“Miss French,” he said.

“Hello,” Belle said, short and curt.

He removed his coat, smoothing the trench and scarf over his knee before centering his cane in front of himself and leaning forward with a smile on his face. Belle watched as he removed his glove and stretched his fingers over his cane’s golden handle, large ring sparkling in the dim light of the convent.

“You’re the richest man in town,” Belle said. “You couldn’t have offered a little more in your donation?”

He looked at her sideways. “And a lovely evening to you too, Miss French. All the donations are coming back to me, anyway. I really don’t see the issue.”

He smoothed his coat once more, and leaned forward again. Belle could see the smile on his face from here, the one that couldn’t wait for the show to start, the one that took no pain hiding how excited he was for the frog-voiced singer to take the stage.

“You seem very eager for tonight’s event,” she said.

“I am, actually. Been looking forward to this for a long time.”

“Other people’s pain brings you joy?”

He scoffed, and made a show of looking around. “No one seems to be in pain at the moment.”

“But you’re expecting them to be. You’re expecting tonight’s fundraiser to fail. You can’t wait for it.”

“I can wait for it, actually. Patience is a virtue, one with such satisfying reward when one’s labor finally bears fruit.”

“And what labor is that, exactly?”

Gold sighed, leaned back from his cane, and looked at her. “I can see sitting here was a mistake. My presence grates on you. I’ll kindly reseat myself.”

“Why don’t you sit by Mother Superior? Enjoy her company as you spit on her predicament all evening.”

He gathered his things, scowled while standing. “I was a fool for thinking you wouldn’t mind mine. You look lovely this evening, by the way. Tell me, how’s your new book?”

“Is that your way of flirting? Responding to my scolding by telling me I’m lovely, reminding me that you gave me an extravagant gift?”

“It wasn’t a gift. It was bought and paid for.”

She reddened. “And do you often ask for kisses as payment?”

He sat back down in rush, heated cloud around him. “No, actually, I’ve only asked for a kiss once. And, I feel it’s vitally important to note, the kiss I asked for was given without hesitation.”

She bit her lip and blinked rapidly. “There was a little hesitation.”

“Only a little. You must have _really_ wanted that book.”

She turned away, too red faced to answer anymore. His face had gotten so close. When he went to rise again, she touched his leg, and he stiffened, but remained seated.

After a long moment, she spoke. “I just don’t understand why you want them evicted.”

He was quiet a long moment, too. “Nothing I do is for you to understand.”

“It is if you want to sit by me, or call me lovely.”

He picked up her hand where it had touched his knee, picked it up and turned it upright. Her breath stopped as he ran a thumb up from wrist to fingers, opening her up and exposing her palm to him. He studied her hand a moment, her skin, her color, her lines.

“Do you read tarot, Miss French?”

Belle swallowed. “If you know the answer to that question, and I think you do, you better start calling me Belle.”

His face turned towards her, close again, warm again, and gave her another long look.

Before he could say her name, the show started.

They had somehow missed the lights dimming around them, the curtain pulling back. She knew an anticipatory smile was making its way across Gold’s face as the lead took the stage, could feel Gold’s excitement spreading through her hand where he still held it.

The lead, for their poor, precious part, wore an awkward face before starting. Like an apology before they opened their mouth and subjected the audience to whatever was about to come out.

But then they started to sing.

Belle had read through _Familiar Slither: Amphibians & Reptiles of Northern Maine_, much the same way she assumed Gold had, when readying her spell for tonight’s performance. But she hadn’t found a satisfactory answer in its pages. Constance Merriweather was focused on America, after all, and it was to her Australian roots Belle had to turn to find proper placement around the spell’s word _frog_.

The Australian tawny frogmouth owl, for instance.

The sounds that came from the lead as they started singing weren’t beautiful, per say. They were deep, soft, strange, and thrummed in a melodic haunt. As long as they didn’t hit any high notes, Belle was confident there would be no croaking or creaking or wailing tonight.

The song they sang was pleasant, serene. The congregation sat up, leaned forward, surprised but drawn in. The melody was so sad, so deep, so longing. It streamed a trail out the church doors, and caught the ears of passersby. They were lured to the convent, the song. They started filing in, one by one, polite _excuse me_ ’s as they started filling up the seats, eager for the strange voice singing before them.

One song after another, the congregation filled. A backing choir occasionally joined the lead, amplifying the melody, the strange singing. The audience sat rapt, Sister Astrid’s basket filled, and Gold’s hand grew colder and colder where it held Belle’s.

“You did this,” he said, hard, thin.

As the concert came to a conclusion, Sister Astrid took to the stage during the great applause that filled the convent, the lead bowing with pride. Astrid held her basket high, Mother Superior announcing that the nuns had reached their fundraising goal, but only just! It had been achieved down to a mere penny, but they had nevertheless reached it.

“A penny!” Sister Astrid whooped.

Mr. Gold released Belle’s hand without a word, and stormed out of the convent.

 

**Seven**

The dark half of the year was Belle’s favorite, and November held its own magic. Sandwiched between the excitement of Halloween and the frenzy of Christmas, it was a month for breathing and self-reflection.

And making wishes.

While the end of the month had the town swarming over ovens and stoves and meals for many, Belle hid herself away in her apartment, making sure she was good and alone while she prepared her single home-cooked meal, as she did every year on the cusp between November and December. A farewell to Samhain, a welcome to Yule. Leaves fallen, snow arriving. With the setting of the sun and transitions on her mind, Belle tucked her meal into its basket, covered it in black linen, and prepared for her journey.

The yearly delivery called for crossroads. She chose the woods, because she loved the woods, and she could visit her favorite tree, and leave behind another apple before making her other stop. The woods also allowed her to be good and alone and unbothered from anyone asking why she was leaving behind a picnic basket in the dark.

She smiled as she approached the familiar spot, two crossing dirt paths under heavy pine cover, marking a perfect compass of north, south, east and west.  She stood at its center, and whispered the goddess’ name as she set her offering on the path, giving thanks and gratitude for the blessings she’d enjoyed since last year’s delivery.

She rose as she finished, tugging her coat tight from the chill. She knew the next steps: state her wish, then turn to leave and don’t look back. Should she see a dog on her way back, all the better that her wish was heard.

But Belle was still unsure of her wish. She’d thought about it all while preparing her meal; braising her meat, roasting her vegetables, kneading her bread. She thought about it all along her walk, all during the sunset and rise of the stars.

Because he kept coming to her mind.

The way he’d gripped her hand in the dark of the concert, the way he’d returned her every barb. The way he’d grown quiet, the way he’d insisted her understanding wasn’t wanted or necessary.

But she did want to understand, very much.

She had foiled his plans, tampered his spells. She enjoyed no congratulations, however, because she never really knew the intentions of his schemes. She had yet to find the root in them, the cause. It was a mystery left uncovered, its shape writhing underneath, a shape of pain, of aching.

Belle stood at the woods crossroads, grower colder and more uncertain. She had to open and close her mouth several times before she knew what she wanted to say.

“Let me . . . help him,” was all she could muster in the end.

If she was going to say anything else, now was the time. She wrung her gloves with her cold fingers inside, twisting and rubbing for friction, and sighed. She nodded at herself, and bent down to uncover her meal. She bundled the black linen in her arms and sighed again, knowing her vague wish was the only nourishment her empty stomach would enjoy tonight.

She rose again, and resigned herself to the walk back home. Perhaps she could pass her tree again. The smell of her meal was delicious and her stomach grumbled, upset it was being left behind. Belle ignored it and tried to savor the words she’d chosen for her wish instead, helpless things, but maybe she could find use for them with time. Her walk would help, surely, each step an opportunity for contemplation.

She didn’t get far before she heard a scratch, and gentle snapping behind her.

She stopped. There had been dogs, even cats before, trotting ahead of her or crossing her path, but never a sound behind.

“Belle,” said the scratch.

She knew not to turn around. “Mighty Hecate,” she replied.

“Your offering is well received,” the scratch said. “A welcome and worthy labor.”

Belle’s hands shook, and she gripped her coat tighter. She said nothing, and waited as she heard the scratch become heavier along the forest floor. She heard the weight of steps, the crack of twigs, and waited.

“Belle,” it said again, no longer a scratch, but a clear, solid voice. “He brings me offerings, too, did you know?”

“He . . . he does?”

“He does. Would you like to know what he wishes for?”

Belle hesitated, her mouth opening again, but she bit her lip. “That’s not . . . that’s not for me to know.”

A chuckle. “Understanding was what you asked for, was it not?”

“Yes,” Belle whispered, after long moments.

“Touch him,” the voice said. “Cup your hand, touch his cheek. Only then will you understand.”

“I don’t think he wants me touching him,” Belle said.

“Touch him,” the voice said again, firm, certain. “He will not pull away.”

Belle nodded, the weight of a presence pressing closer behind, and she kept her face forward.

“And Belle,” the voice said. “Keep your athame on you.”

With a rush, the heaviness around her disappeared, the weight of the woods eased. Belle’s hands were gripping her elbows too tight, she released her grip, let her breath shake out before taking another lungful.

The request to keep her knife on her person didn’t bode well. She closed her eyes and pictured Mr. Gold’s face, the way it looked when narrowed in anger. The way it might look if blood trailed his chin.

Belle ran her hands over her face, shook herself of the image. She tentatively practiced the cupping of her hand, then walked home.

 

**Eight**

A crow flew into the window.

Then another, then another.

Nine crows total, and Belle’s heart thumped in her throat while she grabbed her chest and grew pale by the window. She’d dropped all the books she was carrying, dropped just like the crows did to the street outside the library, and Belle should have expected this.

Ashley had just delivered a happy and healthy baby girl, after all.

That she was keeping.

It had been harder to extract Gold’s influence from the bear than it was to change the singer’s voice from frog to bird; the latter required manipulation and rewriting, the first required complete removal and sabotage. She had succeeded, however, and now it seemed Mr. Gold had discovered the last of her tamperings.

Belle turned to the circulation desk, and sure enough her latest crop of violets was wilting. And the sigils she’d traced in the lights were glowing, and the chimes she’d hung near the restroom were sounding. No wind reached that part of the library, she knew what their sound meant.

By her computer, the book that had once been a first edition of _Wuthering Heights_ was fluttering its pages back and forth, probably eager for the return of its master. Belle set a hand on the book, calming its pages, but the moment she removed it, the book started its flutter again.

Looking up, Belle saw all the patrons of the library rise as a collective to leave. One by one, they filed towards the door, blank looks upon their faces.

This wasn’t one of hers.

Walking out into the middle of the floor, she watched as all the people of the library left, filtering out the door together in silence. Books forgotten, set on the tables and chairs where they were being read, or back onto the shelves, mismatched where they didn’t belong.

He was coming. He was coming and he wanted her alone.

Belle squared her feet as best she could.

Her athame was on her, as Hecate had instructed, and she reached into her clothing to rub its handle. She pictured that gold tipped cane of his, his grip tight, his eyes gleaming black.

She shook her head. He wasn’t violent, she was being silly. He gave her a book, he asked for kisses, his hand grew cold in the dark when he became angry. His style was interference, his style was pulling puppet strings, his style wasn’t violence.

She let go of the handle.

The library had dimmed, grown quiet all around her. Her chimes still sounded, but softly. Her book only fluttered a page or two. She looked up, her sigils had dulled. But her violets, burnt to a crisp, and just ahead, a painting she’d enchanted to provide similar warnings of caution and terror - its subject had turned to face her, its mouth open in a screeching o, its hand pointing, pointing where? Pointing behind her, just behind -

Belle spun around, face to face with the man whose plans and schemes she’d foiled. His teeth white and crooked with a sneer, his breath hot on her face. He rounded on her, head tilted, eyes flashing.

“You’re a _witch_ ,” he hissed.

“ _Y-you’re_ a witch!” Belle said.

He was stepping forward, pushing her back, her feet fumbling and her hands darting until he had her backed up to the wall, pinned between his arms, right next to her painting continuing its silent shriek.

“Do you know what you’ve done?” he whispered.

“Spoiled your grand eviction of the nuns?”

“Oh, you’ve done far more than that, dearie. You’ve been playing games with me for quite some time.”

Belle tried to scoot to the side, but he blocked her.

“I’m not fond of games,” she said.

He tapped the wall beside her head with his cane, loud thump.

“You allowed the nuns to retain their dismal convent,” tap, “you mucked up the Eyes I placed around town,” tap, “you switched out the names on my contract with Midas-”

“What? Oh, that wasn’t me. The others, sure, but Midas-”

“You sullied my fountain in town square,” tap, “you removed the safety charm on the book I gave you, and you,” and here his tap fumbled, his face scrounged into pain, and she withered at his stare.

His voice grew dark, low. “You made me feel … you allowed me to think … that someone as lovely as you could ever turn your eye to someone as … vile, as me. That was unnecessary, dearie, and particularly cruel.”

Belle blinked rapidly. “You think that’s what I did?”

“You planted the Lovers card on my table,” he said, spitting, like the words tasted terrible in his mouth.

She marveled at his expression, the clear hurt on his face. “I didn’t,” she said.

“A heartless ruse. You’ve had your laugh at an old man, now, dearie, but you’ve been found out.”

“Did you have the vision too, then, when you touched it?”

“Vision,” he scoffed. “You _mock_ me. You planted that too.”

It was Belle’s turn for her eyes to flash, her teeth to grit. She pushed on Gold’s chest, pushed him back from where he’d trapped her against the wall.

“Now, I will readily admit to placing blocks over the clouds of surveillance you put around town to stop your eavesdropping,” push, “and I will _gladly_ admit to changing that singer’s voice so they didn’t embarrass themselves up on that stage,” push, “and _yes_ , I even ‘sullied your fountain’ and ruined that little escapade of bad luck you so clearly enjoyed watching. But I did not,” push, “ _I did not_ ,” push, “plant the Lovers.”

She had successfully pushed him to the middle of the room, face just as invading as his was when he had her pressed to the wall. He grabbed one of her hands now, held it to his chest to stop her tirade.

“Or that vision,” she finished.

He gave her a dark look, eyes narrowed and mouth flat. “But your worst crime, Miss French - you stole Ashley’s baby from me.”

Belle’s mouth gaped. “I did nothing of the sort.”

“So you deny that, too.”

“I don’t deny stopping you. I know exactly what you were planning with that teddy bear you gave her, with Regina. I stripped that bear of its doubt before its false layer of excitement burst.”

“And you replaced it with what - more excitement? An overabundance of confidence?”

“I replaced it with nothing. I abolished everything you’d tainted it with. The excitement, and the doubt. You were trying to control her, Gold. You were taking away her choice. How could you?”

“You think a waitress and an unemployed buffoon are fit parents?”

“That’s not for you or me to decide. And I know you well enough to know you don’t care about that. What was it really about, Gold? Why in the _hell_ would you want someone else’s baby?”

“Hell,” he mused. “ _Hell_ is exactly what I’m going to give you, Miss French,” he held up the hand he’d grabbed, looked down at her palm. “All this time, you’ve been playing with me. Pretty Belle French, sweet librarian with her sweet recommendations. You played your part well, my love. All this time, and I didn’t know who the player was. Now, I do.”

“Why did you want Ashley’s baby?” Belle demanded.

He looked up from her palm, into her eyes and for a moment she saw the swirling gray in the black of his eyes.

“You wouldn’t understand,” he said.

“Try me. Tell me. I can’t understand if you don’t tell me. Please.”

“No. No. You get nothing, Belle French. I’m going to bind you. I’m going to hex you. And when I’m finished, you’ll be lucky if the only magic you can perform is pulling a rabbit out of a hat.”

He pressed his thumb down into her palm, and she cried out, a searing pain and light overtaking her. It lasted only a moment, one wild, blinding moment, before the pain and the light were gone. When she blinked her vision clear, Mr. Gold was blurring before her. She reached out to grab him, fumbled with his chest, his arm, down until she was awkwardly grabbing his sleeve, awkwardly grabbing his wrist where his hand was missing.

In a brief moment that contained no sound or vision, she felt the sob of a child.

“What was that?” she gasped.

“Damn you,” he said, before disappearing in a swarm of black.

Belle stumbled backwards, falling on her ass and groaning. When his black clouds disappeared, the library breathed a sigh of relief at his exit. Belle shook and trembled and blinked, trying to make sense of what had just happened. Her sigils no longer glowed, her chimes no longer sounded, and all was quiet.

She held up her palms, stared at them, but saw no discernable mark where he had burned her.

She patted her clothes, checked her pocket for her athame, safe and sound. And the other pocket, where she kept her glass orb. The orb she had used to remove and collect the glamor he’d placed upon the book he’d given her, the orb with his swirls of gray and black.

Not a glamor, but a charm, he’d said.

What kind of charm had he called it, again?

 

 

**Nine**

Hell, he’d said. I’ll give you Hell.

She was in a small Hell, right now, having closed her apartment door, pressed her back to it, and slid down the frame. Her knees to her chest, head to her knees, orb in her hands. Something wet – oh, she’d been crying – and she played the scene over in her head again.

 _I’m going to bind you, I’m going to hex you_. But he hadn’t. Her magic felt intact, the same, the usual as it always had. She’d already tested a small spell or two, levitating a book, turning the lock to her apartment door with a whisper. She needed to try something bigger, she knew, but for now she held her orb, and marveled at how it had saved her.

A safety charm, why had he given it to her? She couldn’t work it out, the same way she couldn’t work out the child she’d felt when she’d grabbed his wrist.

She should be mad, or frightened, or something, but all she felt was heavy and sad.

She wiped at her eyes and stood, rubbing her orb with her thumb. One more spell, one more to assure herself that her magic was still well and good.

Her ashy violets from so long ago still rest on her windowsill. She pulled out another small white candle, just as she did before, bathed it in rainwater, just as she’d done before. She got out her needle, started carving _Mr. Gold_ , but could only get as far as the _G_. She needed his real name, she did.

The white candle suddenly snapped in half and she gasped. Her grip had been too tight, and she swiped at her face again – still wet.

“Oh!” she cried, her orb in one hand, forehead in the other. She paced her apartment, mumbling, trying to find the words she needed, and they came in a jumbled rush. The words that evaded her in the woods with Hecate came tumbling forward, now, all over her living room, bedroom, kitchen.

“How can I, how can I help you? Who did I see, who did I hear? Why do you need a baby, I heard a child, why do you? And the charm, why would you give it to me? _Me?_ Protection, safety, to me, why? The Lovers, a kiss, why? What’s … plaguing you, haunting you?”

Nobody answered, and she sat on the floor again. Held her face, and sat.

She waited until she could hear her heartbeat over the sound of her sobs. Once her breath had calmed, she counted the beats, counted until she got to a number high enough that felt ready to try another white candle. She didn’t have Gold’s first name, wouldn’t get it, but she still needed to try her spell.

When she lit another ashy bud, it ignited the same way it had last time, grew lush and black again like it had done last time. Her magic was unscathed, untouched, and she eyed the orb again. The orb, swirling black and gray; the violet, black with its gray center. She plucked the bud apart, opening it and separating its petals, hoping the gray would tell her something the further she pulled it apart. It said nothing, and fell to bits at her feet.

Belle went to bed. Tucked firm and deep under her covers, orb in her hands and brought to her lips, questions tempted to whisper again, and she went to bed.

Her dreams were fevered. Heavy and dense. In them, she was back at the library, falling when Gold pricked her palm. He fell with her, catching her, cradling her, laying her down.

“Rest,” he said. “Shall I carry you to bed, darling? I’m not good for it, the right side of me is in such pain. You may not see it, but the muscles here,” and he held up his wrist without hand, “the muscles, here, they’re … overworked. Always gripping, you see, I can’t let go, or I’ll lose him. But if you’ll allow my magic to carry you, we’ll have you to bed in no time.”

In her dream he carried her up the stairs, the long arms of his magic around her, feeling every bit like real touch. He folded her into bed, joined her at her side, and those magic arms wrapped round and round her, encasing her, encouraging her to sleep, rest, stop.

“Belle,” his voice said. “I’m wasting time, Belle. Now, I need him _now_ … I’m always needing him _now_ , how soon is now?”

She blinked awake, blindly reaching for a man that wasn’t there, nearly knocking her orb off the bed. She caught it in time, groaned while bringing it to her chest. She’d almost dropped the thing, almost cracked and spilled his magic everywhere, her charm useless unless she stood over the spot where it would have sunk into the wood floors.

She rolled onto her back and stared out at the early morning. The sun had set hours ago, and it would be hours still until it rose.

It was impractical to carry an orb with her forever. If the arms of his magic wanted to wrap around her, then so be it.

She rose groggy from bed and made her way to her bathroom, started drawing herself a bath. She sat on the edge of her tub’s porcelain, trailed a hand through the steam as it rose before her. She whispered to the orb once more, made her intentions plain, and placed the orb in the water.

 _Out_ , she said.

His magic left the orb, slow and steady, her clear water growing black and swirling. It hugged her legs when she stepped into the tub, followed up her body as she sank into the water. It ebbed and flowed around her, tasted her skin, poked tentatively at her pores.

 _In,_ she said.

Immersing herself fully, she pushed herself to the bottom of the tub, gathering the strands of her hair to make sure they were fully immersed as well. She pressed her feet and hands into the tub, arched her back and pushed her head back, releasing bubbles as his magic swirled and swam around her, sank into her. It rounded her waist, her back, her breasts, her legs, arms. And when she rose for breath, it followed, wanting more of her lips, her eyes.

She rubbed her face, pushed her wet hair back. She dipped her fingers into the tub, traced sigils over her face and chest. Whispered what comforts she knew, gratitude for what the charm had already done for her, what it would hopefully continue to do.

She stayed in her bath until it went cold. She rose and toweled herself off, pulled the plug to drain the tub. She marveled at the clear water that swirled away, no black or gray, it’d all been absorbed into her skin.

By the time she was out of the tub and dry, a Winter Solstice sun was greeting her, just lighting the sky to pale blue over the horizon.

She normally greeted the winter sabbat with the lighting of a candle, an invocation of the Great Mother, or some other Yule tradition. But with Gold’s magic swirling through her skin, breathing in and out with every breath, she readied herself with a man and a destination in mind.

She had a name to collect.

 

 

**Ten**

He answered the door, she in no more than a nightgown and trench coat, he in a half-assembled suit and frown, but at least he’d opened the door.

“If you’ve come for a deal, you’ve come to the wrong place.”

She said nothing, just held out her palm to him, her small, empty orb inside.

“May I come in?”

His scowl and narrowed brows said _absolutely not,_ but with a step backward he was opening the door wider and allowing her inside.

She handed him the orb as he closed the door behind himself, accepting her offering with those still narrowed brows, and she tried to explain.

“My book … after I left the shop, it had grown heavy with magic. More than it initially had to begin with. Was it when you touched the cover, or when I kissed your cheek?”

He didn’t answer.

“It doesn’t matter, I suppose. You kept asking what I wanted at your shop. It was your magic, you see, I needed a sampling, so I could … figure it out, change it. It’s how I managed to … thwart you, in everything. I placed it in here,” she said, touching the orb where he held it. “And it was in my pocket when you tried to hex me.”

“My charm,” he said, looking at the orb.

She nodded.

“It …” and he looked at her more closely now, held a hand up to reach her face, but put it back down.

“You still have your magic.”

She nodded again.

“And you came here? What’s to stop me from hexing you now?” He held up the orb. “Charm’s not there now.”

She shook her head. “I … bathed in it.”

He set the orb down on his entryway table, and scowled. “Think you’re clever, do you?”

She bit the inside of her cheek. “I didn’t come here to ‘a-ha’ you.”

He stepped up to her, placed a hand on her shoulder, closed his eyes. When he took a deep breath, she did too, feeling the way the expansion of his lungs encouraged her expansion as well.

“I … can feel where it touches you. My magic.”

“Yes,” she said. “Your safety charm.”

He withdrew his hand, took another deep breath, and this time her lungs felt no compulsion to follow.

“You still expect it to help you? You bathed in my charm, placed my magic all over you? Into your skin? It will respond to me, you know. Change its course, if I call for it.”

She blinked. “And will you? Do you still mean to harm me?”

“Bind you. Stop you,” he corrected. "That was my intention. I could still do it.”

“But will you?”

He sighed, turned away from her. His shirt was untucked from his suit pants, half buttoned and exposing part of his chest. She saw he wore no socks or shoes. He didn’t have his cane, was leaning on his wall. She had interrupted his morning.

“It’s early, Belle. Why are you here?”

She bit her lip, tried to unwrap her arms from around herself.

“You gave me a safety charm, Gold. You allowed me into your home the day after you tried to hex me. Why?”

“You came all the way over here to ask me that?”

“Yes,” she pushed. “And … to apologize. I hurt you. My intentions were to … thwart you, stop you from … doing harm to others. Not to harm you in return.”

He turned around, hand in his pocket, expression unreadable.

“When you first came to my shop,” he said, “when you came up to me in the street, you wouldn’t say what it was you wanted. Oh, ‘books,’ you’d said, but not what you _wanted_. I thought you were like anyone else who comes to me. Someone in trouble. Trouble you wouldn’t tell me, so I gave you a charm, for whatever it was you weren’t asking for.”

“Why?” she asked again.

He shook his head. “But what you really wanted was just a piece of my magic to tamper with. Do you know how invasive that is? How disgusting?”

She scoffed. “Well, what is it _you_ want? That’d you go to such wild lengths to acquire a baby? That could easily be described as disgusting.”

He bit his lip now, stared down at her with hard eyes. “Not a baby,” he started. “Not a baby, per se. Just the baby’s hair.”

“Their … hair?”

“The hair of a child given up willingly,” he said, like reciting from a book. Then, tilting his head to the side, “Well. The child given up willingly, not the hair. That could be willing or not. I just needed it, but now I have no willingly-given-up child to procure the hair from.”

Belle blinked, trying to reason his meaning. “Hair. From a child, given up. For … what? A spell ingredient?”

“For a price,” he said, voice growing stiff. “That I have to pay.”

She nodded, looking down, thinking. “Let me help you.”

“You want to help me?”

She wrapped her arms around herself again. “I went to Hecate … left her an offering at a crossroads. And I asked her how I could help you.”

He was quiet a long time. “In your offering to Hecate, you asked to help me,” he marveled. “Why?”

“Don’t be daft. You know why.”

He rounded on her, much like he had at the library. But it was different, this time.

“Then don’t be daft about the charm. You know why I gave it to you.” 

She didn’t step back from his approach, or his scolding. Just swallowed, and continued.

“I spoke with Hecate,” she repeated. “I asked her . . . how I could help you.”

He said nothing.

“She told me to touch you.”

“Touch me?”

“Yes. Like, like this.”

She cupped his cheek, and he did not pull away, just as Hecate had said. Instead he leaned into her touch, pressed his cheek in further.

“What is this supposed to do?” he whispered.

“I don’t know.”

He nodded, closed his eyes. He opened his mouth, released a sorry sigh. He turned his face deeper into her palm, let his lips brush her skin.

“You called yourself vile, earlier,” Belle said. “You’re not.”

“You’re so sure of that?”

“Of everything I’ve learned about you … all your schemes, your contracts, your plans … there are many things I’d like to call you, but vile isn’t one of them.”

He chuckled, though his eyes were crinkled sad. He kissed her palm, slow, then her fingers, her wrist.

“You’ve done harsh things, but you’re not vile, don’t you see?”

“I, I can feel where you put my magic, Belle,” he said, and his arm was starting to come around her waist. “Your forehead, your cheeks, your belly, your breasts … it’s everywhere. You truly did bathe in it, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” she said.

He cupped her hand where she held him, gripped his arm tighter about her waist, and pulled her into him. When he moved his face down to hers, her eyes widened large and he waited, his brown deep into her blue, no black, no gray.

She rose up on her toes, and kissed him.

He fell into her, his weight giving in to the movement of her mouth, and her back was to the wall again before she knew it. He wasn’t spitting anger at her this time, but cradling her face, opening and closing his mouth to hers, nuzzling her neck, hefting breath into her hair. She returned every touch he gave, opening the rest of his shirt, pushing the fabric out of the way.

“Did you come here for this too?” he asked.

“The Lovers, you mean?” Belle asked.

“Is that what we are?”

“I think so, yes,” Belle said.

He directed her along the wall, pushing her until they were stumbling through a doorway, into a room, his office or? He led her backwards, half of his weight upon her as he didn’t have his cane, but she didn’t mind. He led her to a settee, one large enough to lay upon, and cradled his arms around her as he lay her down.

“I’ve thought of this,” he said. “Dreamt of this.”

“Me too,” she said.

He was kissing her, over and over, mouth as hungry as she’d ever felt, and when his teeth scraped her skin, she scraped him back in return.

“I, I can feel it,” he started saying again. “My magic, all over you. Your legs … your cunt.”

He placed his hand upon her stomach, and whispered something she couldn’t hear. It made a shudder go through her, a surge, and she moaned his name.

“Oh,” he replied. “That won’t do. Lucius,” he said.

“What?” she said.

“My name,” he said, quiet, moving over her, ghosting his lips along her forehead. “Please. Don’t call me Gold. Call me Lucius.”

“Lucius,” she whispered. She’d meant to gather his name, and now it was hers.

“Am I getting carried away?” he asked.

“Do that again, what you did, with your hand,” was all Belle could say.

He smiled.

He pulled off her trench coat while she kicked off his suit pants, he hiked up and pulled her nightgown over her head and repeated his chants and his hand over her breasts, belly, and cunt. He kissed her, kept kissing her, breathing his spell as his hand roamed her.

“Here?” he asked, pushing his fingers inside her.

“Yes!”

“I still haven’t looked at you,” he said, pulling back to admire the work of her on his settee, naked and arched, his hand between her legs. Her breasts were too beautiful not to suckle, her neck too beautiful not to bite.

“My lover,” he marveled.

He moved his fingers in a slow pump, continuing his chant, kneeling low to whisper it in her ear, his chest pressed to her while he fucked her with his hand, and she moaned the new name he’d given her.

He watched as she shuddered and moaned around him, her come coating his fingers and he pressed in deep, matching his chant to her pulse and allowing her whole body to feel the sensation. She levitated off the settee a moment from the thrall of it all, and he blinked rapidly at the beautiful, rising, naked woman in front of him. A color was starting to pulse around her.

When she rest back upon the settee, she rose, and pushed her fingers into his hair, reached down to grip his waist, encouraged him to trade her positions. When he was resting back on the settee, she hovered above him, one hand upon his face, the other reaching down to grasp his cock.

“Do you,” she said, voice still shaking, “does it feel?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Like the vision,” she said. “I want to.”

“Yes!” he said.

She straddled him, his arms going around her, his hand reaching up to tangle in her hair. He sat up, connecting their chests while she felt him thick and eager between her legs. She rode the ridge of him for a moment while she kissed him, breathing his name and copying his chant once she understood his words. When she impaled herself upon him, both of them paused, moaning, color bursting from them. White from Belle, black from Gold.

She rolled her hips, taking him in and in, and he pumped his hips where he could. Their lips kept together, mouthing their words, continuing their kisses. He untangled his hand from her hair, reached down to rub her clit, let the pulse reach deep inside her and magnify her feelings. The shape of him, long and thick, had her crying out and pushing her hips down harder.

When she came this time, she placed a hand over his heart, and he felt her sensations flowing through him, causing him to jerk his hips and come as well, pumping into her, and she wrapped an arm around him, burying her face into his neck. They were rising, he could feel, and when they came down, back upon the settee, he opened his eyes to colors all around them.

“What’s happening?” he asked, quiet husk.

“Look,” Belle said.

Their magic was floating above them, around them, the light and dark, combining and meshing, holding one another the way Belle held Gold. It was a brilliant gray, silvery and moving, and Gold reached up to touch it.

“I can feel it,” he said. “I can feel you.”

He reached up, the wrist without a hand, and moved it through the color around them.

“I remember,” he said. “I remember feeling this before … this magic … before I ever lost Bae.”

“Bae?” Belle said

“My son. I, I lost him, years ago. He’s trapped. I’m trying to get him back.”

“The … child I felt? When I?”

“Yes,” he said.

Belle looked above them. “Our magic … it’s combining.”

“Combining?”

“The light and the dark. Gray magic.”

“Gray magic,” Gold repeated, running his arm through it again.

“If it’s familiar to you, then … you weren’t always a dark practitioner, no?”

“No. And. Perhaps this isn’t the moment, Belle, but … please, I need to show you something. I need to try something.”

Belle smiled, breathy grin. “Now is the moment. Now. Yes, show me, please.”

They helped each other rise, redress sparsely. He led her upstairs, up to a bedroom she assumed was his own, led her to his altar. Upon it was a scrying bowl, immensely large and wide, filled with water, crystal and clear. He waved his arm over it, once, twice, three times. His arm drew close to the bowl, and the gray magic he’d focused there, and he plunged his wrist inside.

As he did, his hand appeared. And his hand was holding another’s.

A boy, a small child, huddled and holding Gold’s hand.

Gold breathed a sigh of relief, huge and joyful. “Bae!” he cried. “Belle, I haven’t been able to see him … I haven’t been able to conjure his image since … since …”

“Since you started using dark magic?”

“Yes and no,” he said. “Since Mother Superior barred me from light magic.”

Belle blinked in surprise. “She can … do that?”

“There’s a reason I want her gone, Belle.”

Belle nodded slowly.

She looked down at the image of Gold’s son, the dark place he was huddled, the way he gripped Gold’s hand so tight.

“Apples,” she said.

“What?”

All around Bae, like trinkets cherished and stashed away, were apple halves, and Belle’s heart swelled.

“Yours is the child in the tree,” she said.

“Yes,” Gold said, looking at Belle, lips parting. “You … know him?”

“I do,” Belle said, eyes gleaming. “Lucius, you said you need the hair of a child willingly given. That’s the price you have to pay? For the return of Bae?”

“I know it sounds simple,” Gold said, looking back down at his boy, squeezing his hand, Bae squeezing back in the quiet of his sleep, of his tree. “But I wasn’t able to leave Storybrooke, or I’d be separated from Bae forever. Do you know how many babies are born in Storybrooke? Much less how many to parents ill-prepared to have them? I thought it would be easy. I agreed too readily. I dug myself this pit.”

“For the hair of a child willingly given,” Belle repeated.

“Yes,” he said, staring at Bae.

“Lucius. I was willingly given.”

Gold looked up at Belle.

“My birth mother, she was … ill-prepared, as you said, to have me. She gave me to my Mama, the one who raised me … Lucius, you can have my hair. Will that work?”

“I,” Gold started, suddenly short of breath. “I don’t know.”

He looked backed down at the image of Bae in his scrying bowl, with eyes starting to search, his energy starting to vibrate. “Let’s try it. We need to go to the woods. The black willow, you know the one, yes? Right now, we need to,”

“No,” Belle said. “ _Right now_ , Lucius, now. How soon is now?”

“It’s … now?”

“Yes,” she said, fumbling with her trench coat pockets, reaching for what Hecate said to always carry on her, yes, there it was. She pulled out her athame, and without hesitation, sliced a healthy chunk of her hair.

“Now, Lucius,” she said, handing him her hair. “Place it in the scrying bowl.”

Gold’s eyes blinked in surprise, but he followed her direction. It was difficult at first, placing it with the hand that held Bae’s, the one that only connected with his wrist when it was in the water, but it was a task soon accomplished. Bae opened his eyes, and looked up and out like he could see out of the scrying bowl.

“Papa?” he said.

“You haven’t aged a day,” Gold said, wet lining his eyes.

"Pull him out, Lucius.”

With their strength combined, they reached into the wide scrying bowl, grasped the child inside, and brought him to the surface. The tree opened and released the child, and soon a shaking and pale boy was in their arms.

They all fell to the floor together, the boy huddled in their arms, and Belle allowed him a full transfer to Gold. She sat back and watched father cradle son, years of pain slough away in a simple exchange of hellos and I’ve got you’s and I love you’s and I missed you’s. The beautiful boy she used to visit in the woods. Gold’s son, after all.

Belle slunk back, giving the family their moment. But Bae’s eyes blinked as he turned to focus on her.

“Hello,” she couldn’t help saying.

He smiled at her, and held up his hand, the one stiff from holding his Papa for so long. “Five fingers, five toes,” he whispered.

“That’s right,” Belle said, her own eyes lining with wet. “The pentagram,” she explained to Gold when he looked at her. “The hidden star inside an apple when you cut it. I, I gave it to the tree. To Bae, inside.”

“She gave me apples all the time,” Bae smiled.

“You … helped protect him,” Gold said, “Gods, and to think I tried to hex you!”

Belle shook her head. “Don’t. It’s all right. Look where we are now.”

“Now,” Gold smiled, into Bae’s hair, into Belle’s forehead as he pulled her close to join them. “The perfect, beautiful now.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed this! It’s filled with plot holes and ends a bit silly and abruptly. But my life is full of plot holes, and will also probably end in a silly, abrupt manner. Blessed Yule, and Merry Christmas ;)


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